Caroline yawned. The first cup of coffee had taken the edge off of her headache. She wasn’t expecting miracles from her second cup, but it couldn’t hurt to try. Fortunately, the boys were at her ex’ place this week. It would’ve been hard to explain why they suddenly had a young girl as a guest.

She had turned in way too late yesterday, and even then it had taken a good amount of time digesting all she had learned before sleep had claimed her. And, after less than four hours of sleep, she woke up early as usual. A feature of being a morning person. She was unable to sleep in late for the life of her.

It might not have been the wisest move to ask Martin — Tina — to share exactly what she had witnessed. She had expected it to be pretty bad, but wasn’t quite prepared for Tina’s reaction. After telling her story, Tina had laid on Caroline’s lap and wept silently. Maybe this had been her first chance to really digest what she had gone through without the looming threat of doom hanging over her all the time.

Tina’s weeping had caused some strange emotions for Caroline as well. She knew, rationally, that this was her classmate, just as old as she was, but having the much younger-looking girl crying on her lap had triggered the more motherly feelings. They weren’t exactly new feelings — she had two sons, after all — but she had felt different towards the girl than her own boys.

That line of thought quickly lead to a rather uncomfortable question. Tina currently had no place to return to, no income and essentially no family or friends. At something like 14, she would be entirely dependent on someone else, and the most likely candidate for the moment was Caroline. Could she adopt Tina as a daughter? Possibly. But would she? It would certainly be extremely weird.

Right now, it was time to care for the horses. That always calmed her thoughts.

When she returned to the kitchen, Tina had emerged from the grave. Or at least that was Caroline’s first impression. The girl had swollen red eyes from crying recently. Her hair was completely disheveled, to the point that Caroline suspected the girl had tried to pull it out. The clothes Caroline had lent her from her son’s wardrobe obviously did not fit, being made for a boy with significantly less width. And she had paper rolled tightly around her finger, obviously attempting to stop a bleeding. A glance at the floor revealed the source: Small glass shards littered the floor.

“I’m sorry,” Tina said in a voice suggesting she was responsible for someone’s death.

“You’re sorry? For breaking a glass? Honestly, Tina, did you think that’d cause me to be angry?” Well, it was not entirely unreasonable to expect that; she would have been annoyed if one of her boys had been responsible.

“I … didn’t really think you would. It’s just that I have practically no control over my feelings. They are all over the place!”

Caroline asked Tina to just sit tight while she fetched the vacuum cleaner. After cleaning up the deed and offering Tina a band-aid, she put her hands on the girl’s shoulder.

“Listen, Tina. This is your first day as a girl. I’m guessing you’re simply overwhelmed by hormones. Even regular teenagers struggle with their feelings.”

Tina nodded, not entirely convinced.

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“Besides, no one has complete control over themselves while hungry,” Caroline explained while fetching eggs from the refrigerator.

After a few mouthfuls, Tina’s mood seemed to improve. She shared her thoughts on a subject they both had been thinking about since last night; Mrs. Clover’s motivations. According to Tina, the ancient witch had revealed a hint of remorse when prompted for her reasons, suggesting she might have been after some sort of redemption. Caroline found this hard to believe; she had been there and seen no hint of anything other than a smug grin.

“No need to dwell too much on it,” Tina assured her. But Caroline was of the completely opposite opinion; she had too many unanswered questions to simply let this pass.

“My biggest gripe is how easily you accepted magic yesterday,” she said, eyeing Tina suspiciously. “Even I can tell you couldn’t do magic for the life of you. Even now, you’re still dampening my magic.”

Tina sighed. “Yeah, I was actually curious about that. Too bad, I was hoping to do magic myself.”

The older woman very gently reminded Tina she hadn’t really answered her question.

“Ah, that. No, I did not believe in magic prior to yesterday. But I could tell how much you believed in it, so the choices were either to believe in magic or believe you were mad. I chose the former.”

That answer only caused new questions to form in Caroline’s mind. But she no longer had time to dwell on it: Her phone started ringing.

“Drat! The delivery guys. Sorry, you’ll have to take care of yourself for a bit. They’re here with a new freezer. Perhaps it’s best if you stay out of sight for a while.”

Tina nodded, quickly finishing her meal.

After about half an hour, Caroline returned to find Tina in the living room. The girl seemed to be appraising her bookshelf.

“That’s a lot of horse-related material,” she stated once she became aware of Caroline’s presence. “I sort of knew you were into this, but I didn’t expect you to be collecting books for primary school girls.”

“I’ll have you know there are boys that enjoy horses as well,” Caroline retorted. “Besides, I have them for a reason.”

Tina looked with a deadpan expression at Caroline for a moment before her face suddenly lit up. Her eyes quickly darted back to the bookshelf. “You’re the author!” she exclaimed with a bit of surprise.

“You did it again!” Caroline snapped, forcing a sudden topic shift. “I know you’re quick, but that was too quick. How could you tell with so few clues?” If you knew already, you wouldn’t have looked so surprised, she thought to herself.

Tina shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s always been that way. I easily pick up signals people send.”

‘Did I actually send a signal?’ Caroline thought to herself. And kept to herself. She couldn’t quite formulate what she was thinking of, so it was better to leave it for now.

“In any case, you hit the mark. I write books and articles for girls’ magazines. Mostly about horses, but I like to think I’m a bit more diverse than that when I put my mind to it.”

She looked out the window, towards the stables. “Right now, though, I don’t think I can put my mind to anything job-related. I was planning to go for a ride. Care to join me?”

The question turned out to be harder for Tina to answer than Caroline had expected. The girl looked slightly scared, but also somewhat intrigued. “I guess I should make an attempt,” she finally reached a conclusion. “My life was saved by a horse, so maybe I should re-evaluate my impression of them. The alternative is to stave off my boredom with your books.”

Caroline couldn’t quite tell if she should be insulted by that remark or not. She decided to ignore it.

“Well, let’s get changed into something more fitting,” she suggested, pulling Tina with her. “I hope Karl’s riding boots will fit you.”

Tina offered no resistance, though she did look slightly worried.